


Which Kind Do You Want to Be?

by flightrules



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: (mostly just recalled), But anything else is going to take a while, Canon-Typical Violence, Consent, Din Djarin Needs a Hug, Din has some stuff to work through, Eventual Sex, Explicit Consent, F/M, It's not intentional and there is an apology, Kindness, Sex is complicated, This Is The Way, Touch-Starved Din Djarin, also there are lots of hugs, and a brief moment of violence between our protagonists, because good lord does this man need them, brief mentions of (past) dubious consent, yes we are getting him out of that armor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-17
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:00:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27603860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flightrules/pseuds/flightrules
Summary: "There are different kinds of Mandalorians.""Which kind do you want to be?"Where you're from, a man and a woman who found themselves alone together after battle would celebrate a job well done. He's not opposed to the idea, but for a guy who's used to having layers of cloth and steel between himself and the world, it's…. It's kind of a lot.Story is now complete! Note: Rating has been updated to Explicit for Ch. 6.
Relationships: Din Djarin/Female Reader, Din Djarin/Reader, Din Djarin/You
Comments: 39
Kudos: 177





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Notes on Ch. 1: Written during a bout of insomnia, prompted by my fascination with the sheer number of reader insert fics in this fandom. If I had to be awake, at least maybe I could use the time to entertain some fellow fans. 
> 
> Update for Feb. 27: Story is now complete! This was supposed to be a one-shot, which I tossed up on AO3 just in case people might like it. But then I got _interested_ in what I'd set up here and it just... kept going. Warning, the ending is bittersweet.

He's sitting there looking at you, head tilted, and it's like somebody needed an illustration of curiosity for a children's book so they drew this Mandalorian and stuck that on the page.

"Isn't 'stop' good enough?" he says.

"Sometimes people like to say that and not mean it. Having a different word lets you both know you don't want what's happening anymore."

"If I say stop, I'll mean it."

There's something about that voice modulator that makes everything he says sound final.

The two of you are sitting across from each other on the floor, in the cramped hold of the Razor Crest. You're dressed in your usual practical trousers and shirt, but you've kicked your boots into a corner and your rifle's propped against a nearby wall. 

He's still wearing the beskar.

The child is spending the night with Peli, who took him delightedly, crooning about getting him some decent food and a nice soft place to sleep. 

She also spared a moment for you, looking you up and down before shooting a pointed look at the armored man beside you. "It's about time."

"Can you trust her?" you asked on the way up the ramp, as Peli and the child disappeared into her shop.

He shrugged. "With my life? No. With his? Yes."

How exactly _does_ this man decide whom to trust with his life? 

You've known each other, what, a few days? The acid burn on your right shoulder is still raw, the skin still peeling away in shreds. Interesting lesson, that. Gark-vipers don't bite, they spit. 

The scar will be your souvenir from a three-day trek through the jungles of Silicaria. One day in to snatch the little green rug-rat back from the bounty hunters who took him, two days back on tired legs, without food and no idea if the water in the streams you passed was safe.

You were hired help at the beginning. 

By the end, between fighting off hungry jungle creatures, sharing watches through pitch-black nights, and taking turns carrying the kid, you and this man were something like friends. 

Not that you didn't still collect your credits. A girl's gotta eat.

But you also didn't turn down the chance to get cleaned up in his ship's refresher, or to bunk down in a corner of the hold for a decent night's sleep.

He got the baby to bed first, briskly bathing the yawning little creature in the galley sink, then wrapping him up in a clean blanket and tucking him into a hammock in what looked like the man's own sleeping quarters. 

Then he indicated the refresher and sonic shower for you to use. "I'll wait upstairs." 

It was nice of him to give you privacy to get cleaned up and changed, even if it seemed a bit odd to you. Where you come from the human body's nothing to be ashamed of. But not all cultures see things that way.

Clearly his did not. You'd think after what you'd both been through, he'd want to get into some comfy clothes and leave the armor in storage for a while. But no, he switched places with you in the cockpit, disappeared down into the hold, and came back up a little later smelling a heck of a lot better but fully decked out again.

"I promise I'm not dangerous," you said, teasing.

It was a little insulting how easily he said, "I know." But he added, "I have food. If you're still hungry," and that felt like something a friend would say. So you bit back the temptation to remind him that if you wanted to, you could be dangerous, indeed.

The Razor Crest's food stores were nothing to write home about. Your body was going to make good use of the calories though, whether they tasted good or not. You leaned against the galley cabinet and gnawed on a protein bar. He started working on cleaning weapons and putting them away in what looked like a small but impressive armory.

"So what's the deal with the outfit?" Curiosity wasn't a sin where you came from, either.

"What do you mean?"

"You're home, right? We've agreed I'm not dangerous. Who are you planning to fight?"

"I'm not," he said, settling a blaster in its place next to an array of grenades. 

"So?"

"Mandalorians don't go unarmored around anyone but family."

You were struck by a sudden image of him with the kid, the two of them playing tag or something down here among the crates and stowed weapons. The kid in his little brown robes and the Mandalorian in, what? A pair of soft trousers, maybe a shirt that showed his arms. Barefoot, maybe. Probably hair all a mess. If he had hair. Or would he shave his head?

You had to shake your own head to get the image to clear.

"Huh," you said in reply. "Really? I crossed paths with some guys like you, a couple years back. They didn't seem to have any issue."

You were surprised to hear a sigh. "There are different kinds of Mandalorians."

"Do you get to choose?"

He didn't answer. 

You finished up the protein bar and looked around for somewhere to toss the wrapper. There wasn't an obvious wastebin, so when he looked back your way again you held it up, inquiring.

"Behind the door, lower left," he said. And then, "You don't get to choose."

"Who chooses for you, then?"

He turned back to the armory. It looked to you like everything was in its place now, but he lifted out the grenades, turned them over in his hands, put them back. "I was a foundling," he said. "They raised me in the Way."

How he said "the Way," you could hear the emphasis, like it was a sacred word. "A foundling? Like your kid?"

"Yes."

"So, you're going to teach him to live like this, too?"

The answer came quickly: "No." He closed the armory doors. They latched with a clicking sound. "We should go."

"We?"

"The child and I need to get off-world. Someone knew we were here. Where do you want to go?"

What made him think you didn't already belong in the village where he met you?

"You're not from here."

No, you weren't. The place you're from isn't there anymore, though, thanks to the Empire. 

It wasn't a story you cared to tell right then. 

"Sure, yeah, wherever you're headed next." Anywhere you could find work would do. "I'll jump off at the next port." You indicated your shoulder, where the acid burn still stung. "As long as they don't have gark-vipers."

You slept cozily enough that night, wrapped in a blanket he gave you and using the bivy bag from your own pack as padding beneath. At one point you woke to the sound of the child fussing, followed by the man's voice softly singing. The child quieted down and you found yourself lulled back to sleep, too.

“Are you sure the kid’s safe down there?” 

“He’s safe.”

You’re picturing the dusty repair yard, the bare-bones shop behind it, the handful of repair droids who were probably great with wrenches but not so much with guns. Peli looked like she had some wiry strength to her, but she was on her own. “She a former soldier or something?”

“She has a safe-room behind a hidden panel with a ten-centimeter durasteel door. They’ll be fine.”

Your eyebrows go up. Mos Eisley looks like a shambling backwater town. 

“Tatooine has wildlife. Some of it has guns.”

You glance at your own rifle, leaning against the wall nearby. You’ve fought off some of that kind of wildlife before. 

What a strange family you’ve fallen in with. 

“All right,” you say. “Good. I guess you know what you’re doing.”

You expect him to nod, confirm, like he did when you said you weren’t dangerous. Instead, you see pauldrons and breastplate shift as his shoulders sag a bit. “Sometimes.”

This thing you’re doing now, or about to do. It started with a joke. Well, mostly a joke. A victorious mission, the child safe, the two of you safe now too, and alone behind closed doors. The sweat of the mission washed away, guns laid down, a chance to rest. Back home, you said, as you took the blanket he’d found for you, a man and a woman would celebrate. 

You hadn’t expected him to take you up on it, but you also hadn’t expected him to freeze like that, one hand still holding the blanket. Until this moment, he’d looked like that armor was part of him. Suddenly, somehow, the way he reached out to you looked awkward, pauldron and vambrace no longer in line, and that helmet turned the tiniest angle, like he didn’t know where to direct his eyes.

“Never mind,” you said, smiling to let him know it really was ok. “We’re not where I come from, are we.”

Something shifted back now, and the shapes of his armor made sense again. He let go his grip on the blanket as you took it. “No.”

As you went to shake the blanket out and make up your bedroll, you noticed that your shirt was sticking a bit to the burn on your shoulder. “One thing, though, I could use from you. Do you have a medkit?”

“Sure.” He turned in the small space, graceful now, broad shoulders under the beskar pauldrons moving as he reached up to open a high cupboard. You couldn’t help noticing how trim his waist looked, even under all that steel and fabric. Oh well, some things were not for you. 

The medkit had burn ointment and bandages, but no bacta. You’d have been hesitant to use any, anyhow. It would heal that wound in a day, but you knew what it cost. You’d never had the credits to buy it yourself. 

He started to turn his back, to let you undo your shirt in private and get a bandage over the oozing burn. But the acid had dripped far enough down your shoulder blade that you couldn’t quite be sure you’d covered it. “If I promise to stay decent, can you help here?”

He made quick work of anchoring the gauze to your skin with strips of steritape, while never putting pressure on the places that still ached and stung. Those were hands that had bandaged up wounds before. You’d wondered already what was underneath the armor, but suddenly you found yourself wondering what pattern of scars you might find. On a man who clearly fought as easily as he breathed, maybe almost as often--and apparently didn’t have the credits for bacta, either. Unless he went through it so fast, he couldn’t keep it stocked. 

He flipped the medkit closed. He stowed it back on its high shelf, then crossed to the little room where the baby was still sound asleep, curled in that tiny hammock. “Sleep well,” he told you, before lowering the room’s metal door. 

When you woke in the morning that metal door was up and you were alone in the dimly lit hold. You took advantage of the refresher and used your fingers to comb down your hair, where you could feel it was standing on end. No mirrors in here. You’d been too tired last night to notice. 

Well, if you really wanted to know what you looked like you could check your reflection in that armor.

You made yourself at home in the galley, poking around until you found some caff powder and another of those protein bars. Then, mug in one hand and bar in your pocket, you climbed the ladder to the cockpit.

The Mandalorian was in the pilot’s chair, helmeted head framed by the lights of hyperspace beyond the windows. The little green child was nowhere to be seen. You made your way forward to settle into the passenger seat, meaning to ask if one of you should check on the baby. But there he was, after all, perched on one armored thigh, staring wide-eyed at the lights while his tiny hand held fast to the man’s gloved index finger. 

Neither of them looked over at you, but neither one seemed startled when you spoke. You addressed the child, because why not. You’d been through a lot together, the past couple days. You figured you’d reached an understanding. “Does he sleep in that armor, too?”

The baby looked your way for a second, cooed cheerfully, and returned his gaze to the sky. 

You took a sip of caff, appreciating the spark it sent straight to your brain. Caff was a rare treat for you at the best of times, and on that jungle planet, where every bean had to be imported, it had usually been out of your reach. “Well? Do you?”

“Sometimes.”

“Last night?”

“Last night you might have needed something.”

“But most of the time, you don’t have to. You said, family.” You gnawed off a corner of the protein bar and washed it down with another sip of caff. “So where are the rest of them?”

He reached forward to adjust something on the console, a smooth movement of arm, shoulder, and back that left the baby peacefully balanced in his lap. “This is my clan,” he said. “Until I find the child’s people and return him to them.”

“He’s your whole family?” You needed another gulp of caff to process this. “And when you’ve dropped him off you’re just going to--” That couldn’t be right. People couldn’t go their whole lives walled off like that, beskar steel and cloth padding between them and the whole entire world. “Are you sure you don’t get a choice, here?”

He was silent for a long time. During the quiet, the baby looked up at him, then looked your way. The man disentangled his hand from the baby’s grip and rested it on the tiller. “This is the Way,” he said. It was hard to hear emotion through that helmet and whatever the electronics were doing to his voice, but--he sounded quieter than usual. A little slower. He sounded sad. 

“Well,” you said. “There’s got to be other Ways. Those other Mandalorians I met, they sure had a different way. Pretty sure they weren’t flirting with the bartenders because they wanted to keep their armor on.”

“There are different kinds of Mandalorians,” he repeated, same thing he said the first time you asked. 

You wrapped both hands around the mug you were holding, enjoying the warmth against fingers that still ached a bit from the punches you’d had to throw. “Which kind do you want to be?”

For some reason, you couldn’t let it go. You didn’t push, exactly. That wouldn’t have been right. But there wasn’t much else to do as the ship sailed through hyperspace. He was making a couple jumps, he told you, right-angle turns at out-of-the way nodes, to make it harder for anyone to guess the ship’s trajectory and follow. 

In between setting the next course, there wasn’t much to do besides watch the sky, play with the baby, and talk. After a while, he started asking you questions, too.

“What’s it like?” was one of them. What’s it like to walk around exposed all the time, nothing between your fragile skin and the world but a thin cotton shirt and trousers. You’d never thought about it all that much, but he had a point. The knife scar just below your ribs was a testament to that. 

“What’s it like,” you asked him back. He told you about the electronics in the helmet that make it hard for anyone to sneak up on him. He showed you a few of the hidden weapons, although you’re certain there are many more you haven't gotten to see. He explained the history of some of them, how he was wearing not just the latest technology but a thousand years of Mandalorian history. He said, in a way, it was like always having your own backup. Like never being completely alone. 

It wasn't until much, much later, when the ship was on its last trajectory, the baby was in bed, and the two of you were sitting side by side on the floor down there in the hold, a jar of bitter ale in your hand and him still stone-cold sober, that he admitted it was lonely.

And that’s how, after a couple more hours of talking and a night of much more restless sleep, the child’s ended up with Peli as a babysitter and the two of you are alone up here in the Razor Crest, sitting cross-legged across from each other, knees almost touching but with space and several kilos of beskar definitely still between you. 

“All right,” you say. “The word for stop is, stop. You sure you still want to do this?”

“No.”

You’re disappointed, but it’s got to be up to him. You start to scoot back, ready to stand up, to give him some actual room. 

A gloved hand closes around your calf. “Yes.”

You cover that hand with your own. When he doesn’t pull away, you lift his fingers gently from your leg, find the cuff of that glove, and slide it from his hand. 

His hand is trembling.

“You’ll remember? The word for stop?”

He laughs, short and sharp. It makes a faint sound of static through the helmet’s modulator.

Carefully, slowly, you use your own hand to guide his fingers to the bottom edge of that helmet. “How do I…?” He lifts his other hand to help you. There’s a soft, electronic sigh as whatever holds it in place loosens. And then, all on his own, he lifts the thing from his head.

He’s got curly hair. It’s the first thing you notice, as you run your fingers along his scalp and those curls, flattened by the shape of the beskar, spring back into ringlets. You’ve no idea what color his eyes are because they’re closed, and his head is bowed down as, fascinated, you wind one of those curls around a finger. You slide the other hand down to his neck and lean in to plant a single, gentle kiss against his temple. 

It takes him two tries to gasp out the word. “Stop.”

You drop your hands and rock back from kneeling to sitting, putting space back between you.

He huffs out a short laugh again, catches his breath, then raises his head to look at you.

His eyes are dark brown, almost black. Tiny lines at the outer corners hint at how old he might be. The paleness of his skin reminds you, it probably hasn't seen much sun. You might look the same age, but you bet he's got a few years on you.

"Was that a stop for now, or a stop altogether?"

"I don't know," he says. "No one's done that since…" His voice trails off. 

"Do you want to get put back together? We can try again later. Or not."

He's so solemn when he says, "There's no going back." He adds softly, as if to himself: This is the Way. And then, looking at you again, "Do you mind if I…?" He indicates the vambraces covering his forearms, moves as if to take one off.

You can't resist. "Can I help?"

The whole thing is more complicated than you might have thought. It's not just the individual steel plates. Each piece connects into an underlying electrical array, woven into the fabric of his clothing. He shows you first, on one side, then lets you follow his hands with yours to do the other. 

It's probably good you're helping, actually, because his hands are shaking again. By the time you get to the shin guards above his boots, he needs you to undo the catches. 

"No wonder you never take this stuff off." You're kneeling at his feet now, and you reach over to set the second boot next to the pile of beskar that has now joined your rifle against the wall. You worried briefly about just stacking it up like that, but he shrugged. The stuff was made to take blaster bolts. You weren't going to hurt it.

"How long does it take to put it all on again?"

He's watching the tremor in his hands. "It's faster when I'm alone."

"I can go," you offer. "Climb up to the cockpit for a bit and let you…" Let him what? This whole thing got started because he was tired of being alone.

"No," he says. "Stay."

All right. "You've still got a lot of… machine going on there. Am I going to break something if I touch you?"

He looks down at his own body, as if surprised to realize he's still wearing anything. 

"Where do we start?"

The bodysuit array turns out to be a single piece with a diagonal seam across the chest and down to his waist. You work together to undo the line of hook and loop tape that holds it shut. His hands, so capable with fists and weapons, have gone clumsy, and as you help slide the array from his shoulders you can feel the shaking has spread. The man's whole body is trembling.

Underneath, he's wearing a simple, soft shirt with sleeves down to his wrists and black leggings that you can't help but notice cling to slim hips and defined quads.

You knew he was fit. You spent three days fighting beside him. It's still fun to get to see, even if he also looks like he's not going to last much longer on his feet.

You step closer and reach a hand out, and although you can't see his face well now--he's still almost a head taller than you, even with you both now standing in stocking feet--you can hear his breathing quicken as you lay your palm against his chest. His heart is pounding like you've been in battle. 

He's proven he knows how to say stop when he wants to. You move closer again, thighs up against his, belly to belly, your chin against his collarbone, and wrap your arms around him. You're not sure if the sound he makes is a grunt, a laugh, or a sob.

Before long you've sunk to the floor and you end up half in his lap, tangled together, and usually by this point with a new partner you'd be laughing and reaching for bare skin beneath each other's clothes. Here, he's now holding you so tight you couldn't get free if you tried. His face is buried in your neck and there's no mistaking it now. He's absolutely sobbing.

Where you're from, the human body was nothing to be ashamed of. And that includes all the awkward things that bodies do. You slide one hand from his back, up his neck, to rest your fingers in those lovely curls again, and you let him cry.

When he finally winds down, the shaking has stopped too. Gradually his hold on you loosens, and you find yourself shifting against him so you can see his face. His hair's plastered against his forehead now and those warm brown eyes are lined with red. He looks awful, and the thing you want most in the world right now is to kiss him.

He doesn't smile, but he gives another of those short laughs. 

You bring a hand to his face, curving your palm against his cheekbone, using your thumb to wipe away some of the wetness below his eye. You lean in slowly to try a kiss against his temple again, and then his cheek, and then, gentle as you can manage, against his mouth. 

He's already warned you this would be new for him so you're careful, slow, pressure first and then tracing his lips with your tongue. One hand still caressing his face, the other against the back of his head, and you can't resist a gentle tug on those curls. 

But when you do, suddenly he's not responding, until he chokes out your safeword. Stop.

You do, of course, disappointed until you see he's gasping to catch his breath. "That good, huh?"

"It is." And then, he shakes his head. "I don't think I can. I don't know what to do with it all."

You've never been shy around men. Where you're from, a tumble is so normal you don't even count partners. This is new for you. Usually, they keep asking for more.

All you can think to do is say, "You got any more of that bitter ale?" It's not for him exactly, you wouldn't want him making decisions he'd regret. 

It's for you.

He does, indeed, have a whole stash of the stuff, although the dust on the lids suggests he doesn't get into it all that often. You end up sitting side by side on the floor again, backs against a row of cupboard doors. 

When you get up to get you both a second round, your own judgement's fuzzy enough that you plunk back down right next to him, hip to hip, and rest your head a moment on his shoulder. 

A little later his hand finds yours. 

You sit there, side by side, fingers twined together, until both your ale jars are empty. By now you're tired, you're a little bit drunk, and you're still turned on. And you can't do a damn thing about it because the last thing he said was, stop, and now he's probably a little drunk, too.

"I should get some sleep," he says beside you. "You should, too."

You end up back in your makeshift bedroll, while he's a whole two meters away in his sleeping quarters. You lie awake for a while, wondering if he's lying awake too, until the combination of ebbing hormones and the effects of good ale finally lead you to sleep.

It's easy to lose track of time on the Razor Crest, where sunlight doesn't make it down into the hold. But the ship's chrono wakes you with its loud, annoying buzz. 

He's already up. He hits a control panel to silence the noise, then takes the few steps from the galley to bring you a cup of caff. He crouches beside your bedroll to hand it to you.

He stays there a moment while you sit up, drag your hands through your hair, then take the mug from his hand.

He's dressed now in a pair of black trousers and a black shirt that shows off chiseled arms. The color makes his brown eyes look even darker. Overall, the effect is making it hard for you to think.

"I need to pick up the child," he says. "You'll be all right here?"

You rub your eyes, trying to clear your head. "Give me a minute, I'll come with you. I need to figure out where to stay tonight. Look for some work. Maybe your friend can point me in the right direction."

You've gotten so used to having to read him through the armor, it's startling to see the expression of surprise on his face. Like he'd forgotten he only offered you a ride this far. I'll get off at the next port, you'd told him. Tatooine is it.

He settles down beside you, now, watching you sip at the caff. You're halfway through the mug and thinking you'd better get up and get ready, when he reaches out to rest his hand against the side of your head, then draw his fingers through your hair. 

"We didn't get to finish, did we," he says. "Will you stay?"

Tatooine's twin suns are making complicated shadows on the ground of the repair bay. You have to squint against the bright light as you and he make your way down the ramp. 

You're wearing the same clothes as yesterday--it's all you've got that's anywhere close to clean--but you've made yourself presentable, checking your hair in the shiny surface of the beskar breastplate that's still propped against a wall. 

You made sure he looks presentable too, finger-combing tangled curls into submission before you let him out the door. 

Peli emerges from the shop with the child perched on her hip. As soon as he catches sight of the man beside you, the little arms reach out and he's bouncing to be let down.

Peli looks up and lets out a whoop of surprise. "Well how about that! I always wondered what was under there." She finally notices the child's struggles and sets him gently down. "You go ahead to your papa."

The little creature toddles across the yard to be scooped up and examined. "Did you have fun?" He tucks the child in the crook of his arm and crosses the rest of the way to Peli. "What do I owe you?"

She's staring at him unabashedly. You can appreciate her appreciation for how that shirt fits.

"I don't know how you did it," she says to you, "but I'd say this is an improvement. Although," she confides, as if he's not standing right there, "there was something appealing about all that--" she gestures to her own shoulders, hinting at the shape of pauldrons-- "all that shiny.

"Now go on." She's waving the three of you back toward the ship. "I've got a freighter coming in here any minute, and he's actually going to pay me. If you can get that thing off the ground," she adds as if to herself, and then to you, "You tell him if he breaks that thing again he better bring it here to be fixed. No more of that Mon Calamari nonsense."

You've got no idea what she's talking about, but it's nice to know that somebody else cares about this man and his odd little child. 

You'll go along with them for a while, you think, see where things lead. Offer to do what you can around the ship, help out wherever they're headed next. 

Mostly though, you're looking forward to seeing what happens tonight, once the baby's tucked in and you're alone together again.


	2. Later

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Change is hard. Sometimes we make the leap, and then we wonder what the hell we were thinking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently there is more. I watched Chapter 15 and then this happened.
> 
> Maybe turning into slow burn? Don’t ask me, the characters are 100% driving here. I’m just along for the ride. 
> 
> Not canon compliant and not on the current timeline.

The Razor Crest lifts off on a smooth vector toward Tatooine's bright blue sky. He’s quiet as the ground slides away. Light from one of the twin suns flashes briefly into the cockpit. The view past the windows fades into the black of space. 

You’re buckled into the jumpseat just behind him on the left. The child is watching calmly from his lap. 

You still don’t know either of their names. He hasn’t offered. That’s not so strange, these days. Everybody’s got a history and not everybody wants theirs known. You heard people in the village call him “Mando,” but you can’t bring yourself to do that. It sounded like they didn’t think he was an actual person. 

You figure he’ll tell you when he’s ready. 

You’ve resisted the urge to point out that the kid ought to be buckled in. You may have helped save the little thing’s life, but he’s not yours. You’re not sure you get a say. 

“You’re fine with Pavotha?” he asks. “There’s a lead there I need to follow.”

Pavotha has a reasonable network of cities and the gang trouble that goes with them. Enough humans that you won’t stand out too much. There’s a good chance you can find work there. 

Plus, even if you can’t, as long as he doesn’t kick you off: the Razor Crest has food, a working refresher, and a safe place to sleep. “Sounds good to me. How far?”

“Two days. The Crest can go faster, but it burns more fuel.”

Two days sounds fine. That means tonight and tomorrow night, and the child’s got to nap, too. All kinds of things can happen in two days.

Right now, though, you’re starting to feel uncomfortable in yesterday’s clothes. Everything else in your rucksack is coated in dirt, sweat, and other people’s blood. First things first. “You have a way to do laundry around here?”

It’s a tiny sonic washer with an ozone cycle. You toss in your two other shirts and two pairs of trousers, then rummage through your pack to make sure you’ve found all three pairs of socks and the small collection of undergarments. You unbutton the shirt you’re wearing and toss it in. The air in the ship is warm enough, you can spend an hour or two in just the tank top you have underneath. The socks you’ve been wearing go in, too. You consider stepping out of your trousers, but decide that's going a little too far. He probably won’t mind if you run two loads. And it’s not like much more would fit in the machine. 

Back up in the cockpit, the lights of hyperspace are dancing beyond the windows. He’s just getting up from his seat. “Do you mind watching the kid for a while? I won’t be long.”

You’re sitting cross-legged on the floor in the cockpit, in the little bit of space behind the seats, rolling the silvery shifter knob back and forth with the child. The little guy gets his whole body involved each time to catch it, leaning forward and reaching out with both hands. He giggles proudly every time he pushes it back your way. 

It’s pretty delightful. 

You hear boots on the floor before he appears in the doorway. He pauses there, looking at the child first, then turning his head to nod your way. 

You can’t help grinning at him.

He returns a half-smile. 

His hair is wet from what must have been a quick shower. Unless there’s some hidden compartment on the ship--and you can’t imagine where there’d be room for one--that would be a luxury that goes with having just been in port. You’re considering whether to ask if you can have a real shower too, when your eyes make it past his face and you notice what he’s wearing. 

Here’s you, barefoot in nothing but a pair of trousers and a sleeveless top. And there’s him. He’s got his heavy boots back on, and black trousers of some kind of thick, woven fabric that looks like it’s designed to never rip. A long-sleeved sweatshirt looks soft, but it hangs loose on his body and covers him from neck to wrists. 

He steps over your legs to sit on the jumpseat, the one that usually belongs to the child.

You’re still holding the little silver ball. The child chirps at you, patting at the floor. _C’mon, it’s your turn!_

“Don’t let me stop you.”

You roll the ball across the floor one more time, because the child wants it and because it’s lovely to see him so happy. Then you scooch over closer to the child, asking before you pick him up. “Ok if we talk to your dad for a minute?” He looks up at you, the ball clutched in his small fingers. His expression reflects your tone back to you, big eyes gone serious. “Come sit with me?” He doesn’t seem to object, so you lift him into your lap. 

The man is sitting on the edge of the jumpseat, boots planted on the floor and back straight. He’s looking over both your heads, not meeting your gaze.

“Was that weird?” 

He turns his face back toward you. “What?”

“This morning. Going out to see your friend like that. Was that weird?”

The child coos an echo to your question. 

You hadn’t thought, at the time. You’d been too busy appreciating the eye candy, honestly. And he’d seemed ok. He’d been awake before you. He’d gotten himself dressed. He was the one who chose to go out like that.

“It was."

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I don’t think so.”

This is his space, up here in the cockpit. The whole ship is his space. 

He looks so uncomfortable in it. 

Your whole body is aching to reach out to him. But how much of that is empathy and how much is that your head’s still full of the sight of him first thing this morning? Of the hormones you never got to make use of last night?

You lean down to speak into the child’s ear. “Hey kid, I think your dad needs a hug.”

Those big eyes focus on you for a second, and then the little arms reach out and up. 

He’s still sitting in that stiff, awkward posture, but he reaches back. You lift the child up to him and immediately the little body is snuggled against his chest.

“How about if I go check on that laundry.”

He nods, once, and then leans his head down to rest his chin against the top of the child’s head. There’s a shine to his eyes, as if maybe he didn’t get all the tears out last night. Whatever’s happening here, you’ve certainly been part of it, but this feels private.

You climb to your feet and duck out of the cockpit.


	3. It's (not) fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be a simple hook-up. Harmless entertainment for a couple of days on the way to Pavotha. 
> 
> This is _complicated._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter! This story was meant to be a one-shot, but the characters weren’t ready to let it go. Apparently, neither was I.

Hyperspace is boring.

You should have run out to a shop on Tatooine to pick up a datapad or something. A puzzle. Hell, maybe some craft supplies. At least you’d have something to do. 

But then, you think ruefully, you'd been planning on doing _him_. Who could blame you if you'd been a little distracted.

You've already changed into clean clothes, after a quick few minutes in the cramped space that holds the sonic shower. Those things always leave your hair feeling dry and crackly with static. But, how extravagant to be able to shower at all. 

The acid burn on your shoulder is still a little tender. When you touch it, you can feel it starting to scab over and your fingers come away dry, so you don’t bother trying to hunt up another bandage. You can always ask him later if you find you need one.

You check the rest of your clothes to make sure the blood and dirt stains have come out, then fold everything and tuck it all back in your pack. You toss the last few dirty items into the machine and start a new cleaning cycle.

Then you stand there, all by yourself down there in the hold, and spend the next two minutes watching the laundry timer count down. 

This is stupid. There's got to be a better use of your time. You can't go back up to the cockpit, that would defeat the purpose of having left. You'll give him whatever space he needs, for now. 

You’d love a closer look at that armory, but you know better than to mess with the man’s weapons. He did ask you to lock the safety on your rifle--for the sake of the child--but otherwise he’s left it alone. You’ll do him the same courtesy. 

Some of the other cabinets probably hide clothing, maybe other personal stuff. What else would a man like this own? Is there a library of data chips somewhere? Toys for the child?

Pictures of friends? 

There’s an open niche in the wall, on the opposite side from the armory, that you’re pretty sure is a compact carbon freezing unit. 

Supposedly people aren't conscious inside those copper-colored slabs, but--you imagine being stuck in whatever pose you were in when the carbon jets hit you, for however long someone decided to leave you there. 

It makes you shudder. 

Further back toward the cargo door, duraplast cartons are lined up along the walls, secured with cords and netting. The floor in the middle is empty. 

Well, here’s something you can do. Your muscles are feeling stiff and a little achy, the aftereffects of fighting combined with the three-day trek. There’s enough room back here to do some stretches. Maybe some bodyweight exercises, too. A couple days of rest wouldn’t do you in, but keeping fit is what keeps you alive. It's a good habit to maintain. 

You start by reaching both arms up above your head, trying to get some movement in your upper back, but your hands are flat on the low ceiling before your arms are even straight. Instead, you move on to a couple stretches with each elbow bent above your head, the other hand pressing down. The healing skin over your shoulder blade pulls a bit, but it doesn’t hurt too much. Probably good to stretch the skin there, too, try to keep the burn from contracting into too tough a scar. 

“Will we bother you if we’re down here?” His voice makes you jump. You didn’t hear him come down the ladder but there he is, the child at his feet. 

His tone is neutral and that shine is gone from his eyes. Whatever was going on earlier, it seems to have passed. You're not sure if asking right now would be welcome. 

The child’s watching you with interest. The pose you were in probably did look funny. But, you remind yourself, it's also perfectly normal. You can't do the work you do--or the work he does--without maintenance.

"It's your ship," you say. "Will it bother you if I keep going?"

“We can stay busy up front for a while.” 

As you work your way through sit-ups, push-ups, lunges, and squats, you can hear the soft murmur of his voice. It sounds like he might be reading the child a story, but it’s not in a language you recognize. Once you hear, “No, we’re not playing that right now. It’ll be our turn soon.” 

You find yourself wrapping up your routine a little early, interested in what game the child might have in mind. You duck back past that carbon freezing nook and find the man seated at a little fold-down table, the child in his lap. They’re looking at a data pad together. 

“Having lessons?” you ask. 

“Just looking at pictures.”

“What language were you speaking?”

His head turns toward you like he's about to answer but then he pauses, lips parted but face blank. Then he sits up a little straighter, upper body going stiff even as one hand's still holding the datapad for the child. “Mando’a,” he says. “We don’t usually speak it in front of outsiders.” 

“I never heard you, then.”

“No, I’ve already--” he looks down at himself, at the shirt and trousers, so different from the armor. “It’s all right.”

You have a very uncomfortable suspicion that it isn’t. 

You think again of asking but he’s already getting to his feet, child held in one arm, and he’s setting the datapad back behind a cupboard door. 

"Trade places?" he asks. 

So you were right, he's got his own workout to keep up with. "Do you want me to watch the little one?"

"No, thank you," he says. "We have our routine worked out together."

This you've got to see. "Can I keep you company?"

When he doesn’t answer right away, you figure he's going to say no. That's all right, you felt a little awkward at the thought of him and the child watching you, and you're used to having your face and body out in the open. You’ll ask to borrow the datapad or something, keep yourself distracted. And maybe afterward, you'll find out what was going on with him this morning--and get back to what he seemed to want when he asked you to stay. 

The child is smiling up at him and waving little hands your way. 

The man uses his free hand to fold the table up against the wall and stow the chair flat beneath it. A quick tilt of his head looks like, _Fine, come along._

So you do.

You perch atop one of the stacks of boxes while he warms up. He’s got some of the same stretches you use, and some you haven’t seen before. The best part though is watching the child. When the man shifts into a lunge, one arm stretched forward and the other behind, he’s got a miniature mirror at his side. The child’s balance is wobbly but his little mouth is set. 

When they switch to pushups, the child climbs up to sit between his shoulder blades and you’re a little worried you’re going to die right there, watching the two of them together. You can usually make it to about 25 reps before your arms give out. He’s somewhere around 40, the child holding on to the neck of his sweatshirt and giggling, before he gives up on the last one and lets his chest hit the floor. The child pats his hair as you hear a mumbled “dank farrik” from down there against the durasteel. 

“You ok?”

He rolls over, moving slowly enough that the child can clamber down from his back. “I must have pulled something in my shoulder. Hasn’t been right since we got back.”

Up until now he’s done every movement perfectly, hitting each pose with more precision than you could manage even on your best day. “It’s been hurting all this time?”

He bends one knee and sits up, leaving the other leg stretched out. “It’ll heal.”

“Can I help?”

He’s giving you a strange look, eyebrows raised. You’re not sure why. “Help how?”

“Maybe I can help you work some of the knots out of the muscles. If you didn’t do real damage, I mean.”

Whatever he was thinking, your answer must have cleared it up, because his face settles into a more neutral expression. “Sure.”

The child has wandered a little bit away in the meantime, and when you look over he’s playing quietly with the netting that holds the crates in place. The openings are just the right size for his hands and feet, and he’s using the net like a ladder to climb about. You’re not so sure about how high up he’s getting. The crates are stacked only a few feet tall, but that’s already two or three times his height.

The man seems fine with it.

 _He’s not your kid,_ you remind yourself. “All right. Let’s see what we can do.”

It’s been a long time since you’ve had someone to do stretches with. Same for him, he tells you. Learning to fight meant injuries, and as a teenager he’d learned to take care of others’ hurts as well as his own. That was, he says, a long time ago. 

When you learned to do partner work, it was about making bodies feel good. That was a different time, in a different world. Back when you had a home to go to.

He still remembers the movements, and it comes right back to you, too. Except, it turns out he’s terrible at it. 

“You’ve got to let your arm go,” you tell him for the third time. You’re kneeling beside him and trying to help him roll that shoulder, one hand over the joint and the other supporting his upper arm. At first his muscles were so stiff under your hands that nothing moved at all. Now he’s getting ahead of you, anticipating the movements instead of relaxing into them. 

“This isn’t going to work,” he says. 

“Not if you keep fighting it, it’s not.”

“It’s not going to work.” You’re startled how quickly his tone’s turned angry and how roughly he pulls away. 

“Hey,” you say, dropping your hands. “I’m trying to help.”

“It’s fine.”

Things are clearly not fine. “What’s going on here?”

You’re not at all expecting what he snaps back at you. “I can’t take care of another being.”

Oh now, that is not fair. You're not looking for handouts. He _asked_ you to stay. “Fuck you.” The words are out of your mouth before you can catch up to them. “I take care of myself.”

He looks a little shocked. You’re not sure if it’s because of his own words, or yours.

“We already said no strings. You’re not the only one who means what they say.”

He sighs, and just as fast as it appeared, the anger's gone from his tone. “What we started last night. Don’t people get attached?”

“I wasn’t planning to.” You can hear how cold your own voice still sounds. 

His gaze strays toward the child, who’s now perched halfway up a stack of boxes, hands and feet curled in the netting, big eyes watching the two of you. The wrinkles in the little forehead have deepened. 

You try to soften your tone. A child deserves to hear gentleness. You point between this man and yourself, and it’s a choppier movement than you intend. "What do you think this is?”

He gets to his feet and goes over to pick the child up, carefully separating the little claws from the netting. He rubs the little one’s back briefly before settling him in his arms. He always holds the child facing out, so he can look at the world. You wonder if that’s because he’s not used to holding babies, or if he’s projecting. You doubt he'd ever choose to sit with his back to a door. 

“I don’t know,” he says. 

Your defensiveness drains away as you realize, looking up at him, he really doesn’t. _What have I gotten myself into?_ You know what you _want,_ and it’s standing in front of you wearing way too much clothing. Those curls tumbling, just a little too long, over his forehead are _killing_ you. 

But your brain is finally catching up. The casual tumble you had in mind, the chance to blow off some steam with a friend? That’s not going to happen. Not with this man, not with whatever is happening for him here. 

“I don’t know either,” you admit, surprised to hear yourself say it. 

“I can’t make you any promises,” he says.

“I never expected you to.”

His hands, so carefully holding the child, have blue and purple bruises on the knuckles. Yours look like that too, skin over the knuckles still swollen, bruises tending toward dark purple against your darker skin. 

You’ve seen what his hands can do. There was a moment, back there in the jungle, when the child was already in your arms. The kidnapper you’d snatched him from was lying in the dirt, fingers clawing at metal gauntlets as gloved hands closed around his throat. 

This man standing in front of you now, looking soft and serious and no longer angry: he was kneeling astride the kidnapper’s chest. When the body under him went limp, he shifted his weight, moved one hand to the top of the kidnapper’s head and the other below it to his chin, and gave a single sharp twist. 

If this man ever has to make a choice, you have no illusions about who he will put first. 

He paid you for three days of your time, and that time is long since over. You owe each other nothing. You get to your feet, too, so it feels more like equals. “Can we agree on one thing for now?”

He waits. The child watches you placidly. 

“Until we get to Pavotha. And as long as we're safe on this ship," you add, because things can change, and you want him to know that you know. "Until then, can we trust each other?”

You’re expecting him to put a condition on it. _As long as you promise to leave when we get there._

He reaches out with the hand that’s not holding the child, and waits for you to grasp it. 

You reach back across the space between you and rest your hand in his. 

By the time he finishes his workout it’s well into mid-day and the three of you gather at the little fold-out table for a meal. You've each had a quick few minutes with the sonic shower, trading places in the cockpit again so you could each get into fresh clothes. The air smells of ozone as the laundry machine runs another cycle.

There are chairs for the adults. The child sits right on the table, choosing the bits he wants from a ration pack. 

“Have you been to Pavotha before?” you ask. Whatever’s between you still feels fragile. Best stick to neutral topics for now.

“A few times.” He turns to speak to the child. “You can eat those first, but you better finish the rest. You’re not getting mine.” The child burbles indignantly back at him. “Complain all you want,” he says. “I spoil you enough.” It’s the most indulgent-sounding scolding you’ve ever heard. But the child gives a sigh--sounding for all the world like his father--and starts eating the rest of what’s in his tray. 

“Rumor says there are Mandalorians there. I’m hoping they’ll know more than I do, about how to find the child’s people.”

Rumor says? “Can’t you just send them a message?”

He shakes his head. “It doesn’t work like that.”

“But they’ll help you if you find them?”

“Yes, we--” he stops, and for a fleeting moment his expression is one of unguarded panic. He rests his forehead in one hand for a moment, then swipes his palm down his uncovered face. “Gods, I’m-- I haven’t even thought that far. I’ve been so _tired_.” 

The child is still munching contentedly on his rations. He stops long enough to offer a piece of flatbread to the man, who regards him seriously. “No, thank you. You’ll be hungry later if you don’t eat that yourself. No,” he goes on, almost to himself. “He’s a foundling. They’ll help.” 

So much for sticking to neutral topics. You’d thought you understood what happened last night, but it’s increasingly clear you have _no idea_. “What haven’t you told me?”

“What do you know about Mandalorians?”

Not a lot, truly. You know that if you see someone decked out in that armor, it’s wise to get out of the way. You knew when he offered you a job, there was a strong chance he’d be good for the money. You know you don’t see Mandalorians often, but you never thought much about why. 

The child goes on eating, pausing now and then to drink from a little cup that’s just the right size for his hands. As the man keeps talking, though, the child scoots over closer, until he’s nestled up against one forearm. He leans in, chewing on a strip of dried meat while both of you listen. 

Your own food sits forgotten.

He told you already how the tradition of wearing Mandalorian armor goes back hundreds of years. You already know that when he let you help him remove his helmet, his armor, he was choosing to set aside a promise he’d once made. You saw for yourself, last night, how raw he’d been feeling before you even met him, and you saw how quickly, given the chance, that had turned into shuddering tears. 

You hadn’t known, because he hadn’t told you: How his people are scattered. Hunted. That the armor isn’t just a symbol, it’s their survival. That what’s left of Mandalore is a fragile chain, stretched across the galaxy. 

And now one more link is broken. 

This wasn’t your doing. You _know_ that. You don’t need to fix it. 

You _can’t_ fix it. It’s not about you. 

You get up anyway, step around the tiny table to his side. “Are you going to let me hug you?”

He’s still looking straight ahead, at the place where you were sitting. He doesn’t look at you, but he nods. 

It’s completely awkward, you leaning down to get your arms around him, the child now trying to snuggle closer, and him still sitting straight and stiff. Finally you can feel him start to let go. His chest rises and falls with a deep, measured breath. His head and shoulders lean into you, muscles finally going soft. 

A moment later he mumbles something against your shirt. 

“What was that?”

He lifts his head, looks down at the child. “Naptime. I need to go settle him down, or he’s going to be a terror all afternoon.”


	4. Wanting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Either you're in completely over your head, or you're exactly where you need to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Din and our reader character have no idea what they're doing or where this story is going. 
> 
> I have a slightly better idea (the ending is now written) but it's going to be a journey to get there. 
> 
> For now, I'm continuing to let them drive. We'll see what kind of map they find.
> 
> Tiny update February 18: Had to make a few small edits so the next chapter will work. These two keep surprising me. (No drastic changes here, just getting clearer on a couple of character points.)

You finish the food in your ration tray while he carries the child to his sleeping quarters. You can hear him responding patiently to the child's babbles. 

"We can play after your nap."

"Yes I know I promised. Sleep first."

And finally, "See, I knew you were tired." He pats the child's head and tucks the blanket in around him. 

The door to the sleeping compartment slides closed.

"He'll be ok alone in there?" you ask.

"He knows how to open the door."

“I didn’t realize how deep that all went," you say as he sits back down across from you. "I never knew the history."

He's sitting with elbows and forearms resting on the table, and it would look casual if you hadn't started to notice how straight he sits when he's uncomfortable. You wonder if he’s practiced this pose, for negotiations maybe. Look like you're off your guard, even when you're not.

“It’s not your responsibility to know," he says. "It's my responsibility to remember.” 

“It’s a little like the people from Alderaan, isn’t it?" You're trying to show him you want to understand. "Not very many of them, now. Only the ones who were off-planet."

There's an edge in his voice when he replies. “Alderaan was a place, not a way of life.”

"I guess that's true. And they live out in the open,” you add, acknowledging the difference.

“People don’t hunt Alderaanians for sport." The last word comes out sharp, sounding bitter.

Now you’re not sure what to say.

He shakes his head, looking down now at his gloveless hands. "It's not the same."

You could remind him, _A lot of people have lost a lot._ You could say, _I have, too._ You could say, _You're lucky. You still have people who would know you. You can tell an old story and they'll recognize the words._

This is not a contest, though. He doesn't need to carry your history along with his.

"Everyone calls you ‘Mando.’ Do you mind that?”

“Names would let them count us. Find us," he says, still looking at his hands. "It's better this way.” He reaches across the table to stack your empty ration tray on top of the child's and then both of them atop his own. "I'll get these cleaned up."

He carries the trays to the little galley, flipping open the panel that hides the narrow counter and small sink.

Even through his shirt, you can see how the muscles in his back move as he turns on a trickle of water to wet a cloth, then begins cleaning the trays by hand. 

You could get up and go over there, rest your head against the back of his neck and put your arms around him. He's used to having his hands covered in cloth and leather, but your hands were trained to give comfort. Learning to fight was a necessity, never a matter of pride. Except… over the years it has been. Being good at your job has been something to hold onto, when there wasn’t anything left. 

You could stay where you are. You can smash down desire. Consent is sacred: You learned how to respect that even before you understood what those feelings were about. You could get through the next couple days of ship’s time, walk down the ramp at Pavotha, and leave this whole thing behind. Leave behind his complicated story and your part in it. 

You’ve gone a while without having anyone to get naked with. You can go a little longer. 

That would be the simple choice.

It’s harder to ignore how much you miss just _trusting someone_. Or how much that’s tied up, in your head, with everything else you’ve been through. 

You can let him lead, here, but that only works if he’s telling you where to follow. "I need to know what you want."

He turns to look at you, moving his head and shoulders as if he still had a helmet on and was looking through the visor.

"I need to find the child's people," he says before turning to face the little sink again, and that's not what you meant at all.

"I need to know what you want from me."

"I don't…" He doesn't finish the sentence.

"I'm not expecting you to go through with anything," you say to his back. "I just want to know if you'd rather I keep my distance."

He finishes rinsing the trays and sets them on the narrow counter. "You don't have to." 

"Do you _want_ me to?"

He closes the panel and leans against the wall beside it, instead of coming back to sit. "No."

"Can I ask you a question?"

He laughs that short laugh. "You're doing fine so far."

Are you, though? Or are you wading again into depths you don't understand? Your culture’s directness doesn’t always fly in other parts of the galaxy, and you’ve learned to tone it down. But so far it’s gone over fine with him. "What does your Creed say about sex?"

He answers you just as directly. "Be respectful,” he says. “Don't make a child you can't care for." 

"But as long as you’re careful, it’s not forbidden?"

He looks puzzled. "No."

"So, you have been with someone. People. Before."

"Yes."

“A lot?”

“Why does this matter?”

“We said, trust,” you remind him, suddenly nervous about whether or not he’ll answer.

He sighs. “If you put a bunch of teenagers together, things are going to happen.”

You’re still guessing you’re around the same age, or he’s maybe a little older. You haven’t been a teenager in over 20 years. “When you were in training?”

He nods, a brief movement. “The fighting corps lived together and fought together. Sometimes people would--” He finishes that with a shrug.

“And what was that like?”

That laugh again. It’s hard to tell if he’s actually amused, or just looking to diffuse the moment. “Mostly it was fast.”

When you were in your teens, you were surrounded by adults who taught you about respect and consent and contraception, and then left you space to be alone with yourself or anyone you invited to join you. You had plenty of partners to learn alongside you, and plenty of time. 

“Didn’t they give you any privacy? Couldn’t you spend time with someone if you wanted to?”

“Yes. There was time. They were kind to us.” He seems to think about that. “Some people did.”

Your memories of learning about sex are sweet. Memories of clumsiness and laughter, of first touches and physical highs you’ve never quite recaptured, even in all these years. “Fast,” you say back to him. “Do you want to try something slow?”

The look on his face is hard to read. It’s been interesting to see how sometimes you’re looking at unguarded emotion and sometimes he may as well still have the helmet on. 

Eventually he nods.

“Is that yes?” you ask, to be sure.

“Yes.”

He doesn’t make a move toward you, though, so instead you get up and go to him. He’s still leaning against the wall as you step up close. You stand there waiting to see if he’ll stop you. He doesn’t move, just watches you. But when you go to slide your hand slowly down the side of his face, he moves his head away.

“Can we not do this here?”

Here, in the hold? In this spot? On this ship?

“Not like this,” he says. He sidesteps you to move away from the wall. “Anywhere else.”

It’s his ship, his space, but it seems he’s going to wait for you to decide. There aren't a lot of choices. There's the little room where he sleeps, but the child's tucked up in there and you're not going to bother him. You've rolled up your makeshift bed, and anyway although it's been comfortable enough it's not exactly cozy. 

Making out in the carbon freeze unit would certainly be kinky, but hell no.

“What was wrong with--” you nod toward the wall where he’d been standing.

He reaches for your hand, pausing just before he touches you to wait until you reach back. Then he leads you away from the table, over to the space where the two of you sat last night, leaning against the cupboards with drinks in your hands. “Sit with me?”

You do, and he carefully takes your hand again, his palm against yours and fingers intertwined. “I never had much say in it.” He shrugs. “When you’re seventeen and someone gets you up against a wall and reaches for you. I never knew how to say no.” 

That's... “Is that what you meant by _fast?_ ”

He sighs. “There wasn’t anything wrong about it. People needed to work off their energy after a fight. I could have said no. I never did.”

“So the other day when I asked you to--” Stars. “I’m surprised you didn’t throw me off your ship.”

“I’m a little older now. I know how to say what I want.”

“Do you?”

“I know how to say no.” He leans his head back against the wall and closes his eyes. “I know how to provide for a covert. I know I need to protect the child. Besides that? I have no idea what I actually want.” A few seconds later he adds, “How do you know what choices are right, if you don’t have rules to follow?”

You open your mouth to answer and then stop. You haven’t had rules to follow since the early days of the Empire, when your village refused to tithe. Since your people learned to fire blasters, to fight hand-to-hand, to hurt instead of comfort. Since you’d all set aside everything you believed in, to be ready to say _no_ to troops who would come to take your crops, your young people, all that you had. 

The Empire had simply flattened your village from the air. 

You’d been off-world on a supply run, gathering the few things your people couldn’t grow or make. You came home to ashes and bones. 

You separate your hand from his and hold it up between you. Pre-Empire, you’d never even seen bruises like that. “My people would be horrified if they knew. That I make a living with my fists.”

“Your people sound kind,” he says. “Can’t you go back?”

Why haven’t you told him yet? _I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to talk about it. I want to think that they’re still there._ “There’s nothing to go back to.”

“Ah,” he says, and it’s the softest sound. 

“I know what I want,” you say. “I just don’t get to have it.”

“What,” he says, echoing your own question from earlier, “do you want from me?”

What you want is to spend a few hours back in a time when your muscles would hurt from digging up ground-fruit, not from hand-to-hand combat and dodging blaster fire. When you could catch a man’s eye, share a smile, share a few hours in bed together and know you would part again as friends. When trust was as natural as breathing. 

_What I want is to pretend that I am home._

“I still want what I offered,” you tell him. “Which was to get naked with an attractive man and celebrate the fact that we’re alive. That was you,” you add, “in case you had any doubt. But what I also want is for _you_ to want it. If you don’t then… It wouldn’t be any fun.”

“You said slow,” he says.

You find yourself smiling at him, and when his eyes meet yours he’s smiling back. “The word for stop is still stop?” you say.

“I’ll remember.”

But then, you’re not sure what to do next. If all he’s known is what he’s told you--You’re picturing him at seventeen, letting someone touch him and not even being sure he wants what’s happening. “Who goes first?”

“Show me.” he says.

You shift up onto your knees to face him, so that you’re kneeling beside him with your own thigh touching his. The first thing you do is brush those curls back from his forehead. He’s watching you as you slide your fingers through his hair, over the back of his head and down, around to his collarbone, then out to his shoulders. You lean in to kiss the side of his neck where your fingers just traced, and the sound he makes is going to make _slow_ a bit of a challenge.

When you sit back, he’s already reaching toward you to echo your movements. For someone with so little experience, his hands are sure as he traces over your scalp and along your neck. But then he pauses. “I don’t know how,” he says, and you remember what he told you before this all started. 

You take his hand and lift it to your mouth. “Like this.” The first kiss you place against his knuckles is feather-light. You follow it with lips just slightly parted, just the slightest bit of suction against his skin. He makes that _sound_ again and you set his hand down quickly, before the thinking part of your brain cedes control.

He drags his fingers along your neck again, from the soft place behind your ear down to your collarbone, then uses his other hand on the back of your neck to draw you toward him as he leans forward. His mouth against your skin is clumsy, the feel of it bringing you back to your own first tries, so many years ago. 

It makes your nerves light up anyway, a line of warmth running down your whole right side. You find yourself tilting your head so it’s easier for him to kiss you there again. 

But he’s already pulling back. “I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“I’m going to ask you a favor,” you say. “I’m going to ask you to stop worrying about that.”

"I’m taking advantage of your kindness.”

At first you’re not even sure what to say. You’re here with him like this because you _want_ to be. You can’t help noticing that he’s _gorgeous_ , but even more than that-- He’s been kind to _you._

You’ve seen how precise he is with a blaster, and how quick to use it. Your people would be worried, to see you with a man like this. To see you here. 

The tears start before you even realize you’re about to cry. 

“Oh. No, no…” He sounds stricken, but his arms go around you without hesitation, pulling you onto his lap and holding you close. He’s resting his head against yours, murmuring against your hair. “No,” he says again, and then words you don’t understand, but they sound so gentle. _“Burc'ya… ner burc'ya… ne naari trikar'la.”_

You turn your face in against his shoulder, letting the warmth of his body sink into your own. 

For a long while, his hands simply rest against your back, palms flat and fingers splayed, and you’re surprised how safe it makes you feel. Like his arms are your own armor, and nothing bad could happen to you here. Eventually though he’s shifting his hands down to tug at your shirt where it’s tucked into your trousers, and you find your body tensing up. It’s not that you don’t still want to feel his skin against yours, to get him out of his own shirt and find out what happens when you drag your teeth over his ribs. But in these recent years… It wouldn’t be the first time a man took what he wanted when you were feeling vulnerable. When a man suddenly seemed to forget the word for _stop._

But this man, he just draws his hands up along your back again, palms against your bare skin now, and settles you back against him. All this time, he’s stayed away from the burn on your shoulder blade, as if he’s never forgotten it’s there. 

Between the warmth of being so close to him and the soft rumble of the ship's engines, there's a deep tiredness stealing in on you. You're trying to muster the energy to move again, maybe to slip your own hands beneath his shirt, when he speaks above your head. "I should take care of the armor." The sound is a vibration through his chest.

"Right now?"

His hands move down to your hips, and then strong arms are moving your body so you're no longer tightly pressed together. But it's only so he can kiss the place between your shoulder and your neck, much more confident this time. "It can wait."

You're contemplating trying to get his shirt over his head when there's a sound from the sleeping compartment and then a little face with big, dark eyes looking curiously at the two of you. 

You immediately drop your hands. "Hi, little one."

He's already moving your body from his lap, but it's careful, not a shove. "Did you have a good nap?" 

The little creature tilts his head at the both of you, and then turns and scurries away.

"Did we scare him?"

But the man is smiling, looking where the child went. "He wants to play chase." He turns to you and you smile helplessly back, already smoothing down your clothes and getting ready to stand 

He raises his voice a bit, for the child's benefit. "I don't know if I can catch him."

"Go on," you say. "I'll catch up." It's a completely silly thing to say in this cramped ship's hold, but it seems to make sense in the moment.

He nods at you and climbs to his feet, a brief groan betraying how stiff his muscles must be after all this time sitting on the floor. He's off after the child in a slow-motion run, giving him plenty of time to stay ahead. 

You spend a little while watching them, the child dodging behind crates, the man pretending not to know where he's gone. 

Then, you go join in the fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sure I'm butchering my Mando'a here but what the heck, we're parsecs away from canon anyway.
> 
>  _Burc'ya… ner burc'ya… ne naari trikar'la._ Friend... my friend... Don't be sad.


	5. Tag

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trust is a straightforward concept, until suddenly it isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a very different kind of story for me, and it’s challenging all my skills as a storyteller. Thank you to everyone who’s been reading and sticking with it. I think we have about 2 chapters to go, after this. 
> 
> One more note: I’m not sure how to tag for this chapter. Something violent happens between our two protagonists in this one. It is brief, it is essentially an accident, there is an apology, and they make their own choices on what to do about it. Your author is not intending to condone abuse in any way, shape or form.

From your vantage point, there are only so many places you can go in the Razor Crest’s hold. But the child can duck behind wall struts and hide in cupboards. Storage containers that come up to your knees are boulders to climb. 

Right now the little one’s careening down the center of the hold, heading for a stack of crates near the far end, a tousled-looking man in very slow pursuit. You make a run around them both to cut off the child’s hiding place. The child lets out a happy squeal as he turns and runs back at the man, who promptly backs away, careful to go slowly enough that the little one can _almost_ catch at his boots. 

They get nearly all the way to the refresher compartment when the man bends down to scoop him up. “Got you!” The child’s cooing as he gets a ride through the air, the man spinning him around before setting him back on his feet. And then he’s off again, running for the carbon freeze nook this time and peeping out between wires and hoses. 

The last time you got to play tag was with your brother’s children, chasing two toddlers in the fields at the ends of summer days. They were small enough to be picked up, too, to be flown above your head, your nephew safe with your hands around his middle, high-pitched giggles filling the air and multi-winged firebugs lighting up the twilight. 

You tiptoe over to where the child’s hiding in plain sight. You reach for him slowly, taking your time so he can duck back out again and toddle away. Now it’s your turn to chase after, measuring your steps as tiny legs run as fast as they’ll go. The man crouches down a meter or so ahead, right in the little one’s path, and those tiny feet skid to a stop as the child decides which way to turn. 

What you do next feels like the most natural thing in the world. “Hey,” you whisper to the child. “Let’s get him!”

The next thing you know you’re on your knees with one arm twisted so far up behind your back you can feel the ligaments in your shoulder about to give way. 

Your vision starts to fade at the edges as pain takes over. 

Just as fast as it happened, he lets go of your wrist.

Your other hand goes to your shoulder as you sink down onto your heels. For a minute or so you’re focusing on breathing, waiting for the pain to subside. When it finally lifts enough that you can open your eyes, he’s crouched in front of you, the child at his feet. 

“Are you ok?”

You’re feeling around the joint with your fingers, looking for any hot spots that would suggest something torn.

You lift your arm gingerly, rotating it through a careful circle. The child’s face turns back and forth between the two of you, the top of his fuzzy head just barely at the level of the man’s boot-top. The big ears are drooping, and the worry wrinkles are back in the little green forehead. “Are you going to take my head off if I pick up your kid?”

He stands, lifting the child into his own arms. “Let’s not find out.”

You can’t read his expression at all right now. He could be thinking of throwing you out the airlock. He could be thinking about what to eat for supper. 

You try bending and extending your elbow. It’s tender, but it still works. 

He goes to the cupboard where the medkit is.

Less than an hour ago you were curled up in this man’s arms. “What the hell?” you ask him. 

“Reflex,” he says, as he hands you a cold-pack. “It usually serves me well.”

You break the seal and wait for it to chill down. “It didn’t serve _me_ well.”

“It would if someone were trying to hurt us.”

Your hand starts to go numb from the cold as you try to parse what he just said. Does “us” include you now? 

He holds out his hand. 

It takes you a moment to realize he’s asking you to hand back the cold-pack, probably since you don’t seem to be using it. He takes it from your stiffening fingers and kneels beside you, pressing it onto your shoulder. His other arm is still cradling the child, who’s still got a few worry-wrinkles but at least his ears have perked up again. 

“What happened to trusting each other?" 

He moves the cold pack from the front of your shoulder to the top. The chill feels good against the lingering ache there. 

“I let you go,” he says. 

Your brain is stuck between how close he is, how carefully he's holding the cold-pack, how steadily he's holding the child… And the fact that you knew he was dangerous… And the idea that you've probably been stupid to think he wouldn’t be dangerous to you.

Well. It's worth a try. "You going to apologize?"

"I'm going to move this to the back of your shoulder," he says, and when you don't object he leans a little closer, shifting the cold pack so it's resting over the back of your deltoid muscle where it connects to the scapula. The child starts to wriggle, and he sets him down while still keeping the cold pack firmly in place. “It’s all right,” he tells the child. “You can go play.”

Chem-packs don’t last all that long. The chill fades as the chemical reaction winds down. He gives the thing a shake, forms it back over your shoulder for another minute, and then gets up to deposit it in the wastebin behind its cupboard door. 

You stand up too, tugging your shirt straight. Your shoulder feels better but your back and neck are aching from how suddenly he put you on the floor. There are probably matching bruises forming over your kneecaps. 

He latches the cupboard closed. 

The child is sitting quietly nearby, chewing on a silvery pendant that’s on a cord around his neck. You saw it when he had his bath, what feels like a thousand parsecs before this moment. It must be tucked into his robe, most of the time. 

The table is still set up, the two chairs still pulled up beside it. The man turns one of them around and sits down facing you, hands resting on his knees. His voice is quiet. "If you were Mandalorian," he says, "you'd be apologizing to me."

You aren’t quiet at all. "If you were from my village,” you shoot back at him, “you’d fucking know how to play _tag._ ”

“I know,” he says, still soft. “I’m sorry.”

You’re sitting in the pilot’s chair, because why the hell not. He didn’t try to stop you coming up here. 

You can hear him downstairs, tools clanking around as he works on the wiring. There was a buzz in the lights, he said, and he ought to take a look. You hadn’t noticed anything, but then you don’t know this ship. 

You don’t know _him._

You could change the ship’s course. You could drop it out of hyperdrive and signal anyone you wanted. You could close the sliding doors, short out their controls, and put the thing on any path you chose. 

You can’t think of anywhere in particular you want to go. 

The main control panel is old, the switches and buttons bulky and square. Many of the labels are faded or gone. Some of the buttons have a depression worn away where his fingers would land. 

It’s also spotless. There’s no grime worn into the crevices. No crumbs from the child’s snacks. You run a finger along the panel above your head. No dust.

It seems he’s precise about this, too. 

_If you were Mandalorian, you’d be apologizing to me._

But also, _I’m sorry._

He knows he crossed a line with you. You didn’t even know where his line _was_. 

The fuel gauge is still well above half. You could reset the hyperdrive, kick up the speed, get to Pavotha that much faster and get off this ship.

Once, you would have turned to your grandmother when you weren’t sure what to do. Your father would have walked the fields with you, checking the depth that you planted the seeds. The first time you and your brother built new irrigation troughs, your grandfather scolded you for taking too much water from the stream. 

_How do you know what choices are right, if you don’t have rules to follow?_

The blues and purples of hyperspace are nothing like the colors of the sky at home. You close your eyes and try to remember your mother’s voice, her hands in the dirt beside you, the way she would give a short, sharp shake to each groundfruit so the soil would fall away. “What do you want to do?” she would have asked. 

You take the ladder slowly, stopping on the last rung to make sure he sees you before you step onto the durasteel floor in the hold. He’s still got the toolbox open, but he’s not working on the ship. 

He’s sitting beside the stack of armor, one piece in his lap, a bright-tipped tool in his hand. The underside of the piece he’s working on is a maze of exposed circuits. The tool gives off a low electrical buzz where it touches. 

You walk over, not too close, and sit, leaving a meter or so between you. 

It’s automatic, already, to look around for the child. The little one is seated at the man’s other side, a collection of small tools arrayed around him. Right now he’s banging one of them against the floor and seems pleased by the sound. 

The man continues working in silence. He turns the piece over in his hands and you can see that it’s a pauldron, the one with the mudhorn decorating the side. He lays down the tool and picks up a soft-looking rag, drawing it over the surface and rubbing carefully around the raised design. The cloth releases a faint smell of pepper as it moves. 

The child is now arranging tools in a pattern, lining them up in rows.

The two thigh guards are already set off to the side, lined up neatly in parallel atop a clean grey blanket. He puts the pauldron down beside them and picks up the other one from the pile, trading the rag for the electrical tool again. Before he gets to work on it, he turns his head your way. “Thank you.” 

“For what?”

“You’re here,” he says. “Is your shoulder still hurting?”

It isn’t, much, but the rest of your muscles feel like they took a beating. “Is yours?”

He looks confused, then seems to remember. “It’ll be fine.”

“Was that really normal for you? You just, fight each other like that?”

“We train for those reflexes,” he says. “They keep us alive.”

“So if I were Mandalorian, I’d know better than to surprise you.”

“Yes,” he says. “But you aren’t Mandalorian.”

Two days ago, you held each piece of his armor in your hands, but you didn’t get a good look at any of it. “May I?”

The moment stretches out for a while, but eventually he answers. “Go ahead."

You choose one of the thigh guards, the simpler one with the surface that’s mirror-smooth. Your fingertips slide over the metal without leaving a smudge. Either beskar won’t hold a fingerprint, or whatever he’s using to polish it has that same effect. You fit it against your own leg. It’s a little long for you, looking awkward against your body.

In your village, you used to play a hiding game. One person would be the seeker, and the point was to hide so well that when they came near you could jump out and tag them. You got extra points if they screamed. 

“We had a game like that, too. People usually needed to be patched up afterwards.”

"Did anyone scream?"

"Sometimes." There's the tiniest bit of a smile. "Less as we got older."

You lay the guard back down on the blanket, lining it up again between the pauldron and the other thigh plate.

“I liked,” you tell him, "being held by you.”

He takes a slow breath, ending in a sigh as he touches the glowing tool to circuitry and it makes that low buzz. “I did, too.”

“That can’t happen again.”

He looks up at the ship’s chrono, its numbers glowing red from the little panel near the ceiling. “We’ll be at Pavotha the morning after tomorrow. I can be upstairs most of the time.” He glances at the child, who’s now stacking tools atop each other until they overbalance and fall. ”We won’t bother you.” 

The natural thing would be to touch him, to show him that he’s misunderstood. To lay your hand on his thigh, maybe, in the place that the armor used to cover. “I meant you almost breaking my arm.”

He draws the cloth over the second pauldron and sets it down on the blanket. He begins to fold the edges of the blanket over, rolling it up so that each piece of armor is cushioned by a layer of cloth. The child abandons his own project and comes over to help, little claws patting the cloth smooth after each fold. “He’s so small. I need to protect him.”

“Not from me.”

“It’s not connected to thinking,” he says. “I’d be too slow.”

“So, no sudden moves?”

He nods, slowly, as if he’d needed to consider carefully. “No sudden moves.”

“Hey,” you say to the child, who has gone over to poke at the remaining stack of armor, the chestplate and greaves and knee guard. “Let’s get him?” The little face turns toward you, but he doesn’t seem to understand. 

You scoot carefully across the floor to close the space between yourself and this man, giving him plenty of time to see what you have in mind. When he lifts his arms to hug you back, he’s shaking again, almost like that very first night. It subsides quickly this time, though, as he pulls you in against his chest, one hand on your lower back, the other between your shoulder blades. His mouth is against your forehead, and your lesson from earlier echoes back to you in the way his lips move against your skin.

You can feel his ribs and belly rise and fall as he breathes deep, and you could swear you can sense his heartbeat against your own chest.

The child toddles over to join you now, climbing up on your thigh to burrow in between the two of you, and snuggle with you both.


	6. No Promises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, a sleepless night is a good thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note that tags and rating have been updated for this chapter. Probably a good time to have any children leave the room.

Supper is the same as the midday meal, cold rations washed down with tinny tasting water. "You eat like this all the time?"

"I try not to," he says. "He needs real food. I haven't had much chance to go shopping."

The child is sitting on your lap now, as you hold his little tray for him and he picks out bites to eat. He's seemed subdued ever since your game of chase went so wrong. 

It's a bit of a balancing act to manage your own meal while keeping the tray steady and the little body balanced. But you turned down the man's offer to take him.

You should be careful about letting the child think there's something changing here, that you'll be a presence in his life. 

It's just so nice to imagine, for a small moment, that you could be. That a child's laughter could be part of your world again.

There's not much conversation over the meal. You're tired and your body still has that vague achy feeling, like it isn't ready to forget getting thrown to your knees. 

The ration trays get washed in the sink again, and then the child gets a bath in the sink again, too. 

"You don't mind, do you?" he asks first. "He doesn't like the sonic shower. I think it's hard on his ears."

You stay at the table while he pushes his sleeves up past his elbows, pops the child into a mess of warm water and soap bubbles, and lets him splash around a bit. By the time the man lifts him out again, there are bubbles all across the counter and water on the floor. "I've told you not to do that," he says mildly as he wraps the child in a towel and, holding him in one arm, swipes a rag across the counter and then uses one foot to wipe the rag along the floor. 

He crouches to pick the rag up again, a perfectly balanced movement with the child cuddled against his chest. 

"I'll let you get him ready for bed," you say, getting up from the table and resisting the urge to go over there and melt yourself against this man. You are _not_ his family, or the child's, and you need to remember it for yourself as much as for the little one.

The bedtime routine consists of a quiet, one-sided conversation, the man narrating all the little things they did today and the child cooing in response. You take the opportunity to use the ‘fresher while he’s busy in the little sleeping room, then spread out your bedroll, stuffing some clean clothes in a carry-sack to serve as a pillow. It's early, but you stretch out and close your own eyes, letting your back and shoulders rest flat against the blanket. 

There's something comforting about his voice, the slight gravel in it, the way almost everything he tells the child is framed as "we." You've never been sure how much the child understands, but you hope he can at least hear how safe he is in this man's care.

You're almost asleep, yourself, by the time he gets to how he hurt you. "I made a mistake," he says, clear and matter-of-fact. "I'll always protect you, but that doesn't mean it's all right to hurt our friend. I want you to know we can trust her. Don't make the same mistake I did."

That's very sweet, you think drowsily. As if the tiny creature could do you any harm. 

"Are you awake?"

You open your eyes to find he's standing a couple of meters away. Earlier today you might have thought that strange, but now you think, _Right. No sudden moves._

"May I…" his voice trails off.

You sit up, making room for him to join you. And now it's your turn to ask, as he's left a careful few centimeters space between. "I'd like to touch you."

His voice is quiet, his usual confident tone sounding suddenly half strangled. "I'd like that."

You don't do it right away, though. You look at him, contemplating. There are curls falling over his forehead again. The scruff of beard he had yesterday is gone. Did he shave for you, or is that just something he does every few days? With the helmet covering his face all the time, he certainly wouldn't have to worry about looking neat. 

Loose as it is, the shirt he's wearing does nothing to hide his solid-looking shoulders, and you've already seen the shape of his chest and waist from the t-shirt he had on this morning. Stars, that was so long ago.

You turn your body toward him and reach out, so slowly, to skim your hands over his hips and under his shirt, pushing the fabric up to bare the flat plane of his stomach, and then a little more so your hands are framing the bottom of his ribs. "Help me?" you say, meaning _help me get your shirt off,_ but he's just staring at you, lips slightly parted, not moving at all.

"You tell me if you want me to stop," you remind him, and then get up onto your knees so you can lift his shirt further. The bruises from earlier remind you to move carefully, but you're able to shift your weight so it almost doesn't hurt to kneel.

He has dark hair across his chest. You resist the urge to run your thumb across one nipple, instead asking him more clearly to lift his arms so you can get the shirt over his head.

He does, now, taking over with a single smooth movement and then actually stopping to fold the thing and set it aside. 

There's something about that that makes your heart hurt. That makes you think you could fall in love with him, if you had the opportunity to try.

You do finally have the chance to see what happens when you drag your teeth across his ribs. You start at his collarbone, lining kisses from neck to shoulder, then down over the muscles of his chest. As you do you can feel his breathing quicken, turning to a gasp as you go from soft kisses to the scrape of teeth. You should probably remind him to breathe but now you're tracing your tongue along a pale line of scar where, you realize, the beskar breastplate doesn't reach.

His hands on your shoulders stop you. He's gentle but firm, guiding your body back upright, giving you plenty of time to fight it if you want to. 

You don't want to. 

"Show me how to kiss you," he says. 

"It takes practice." Kissing a new partner's mouth usually starts out clumsy and uncoordinated, until you find each other's rhythm.

"We have until morning," he says. 

It is, indeed, uncoordinated at first. He's obviously got the general idea--you can't spend 40-something years in this galaxy without seeing what people do--but no idea how to actually do it. He's a quick learner, though, echoing back your movements until he's got the hang of it. And then that precision kicks in and he's got your mouth trapped beneath his, tongue at the corner of your lips and then gently opening you up to his warmth, and you're the one who's forgetting how to breathe.

It's new to him and it's been a while for you, and the two of you end up making out like teenagers for a while, his hand against your jaw and your fingers in his hair, and when you need to catch your breath you bury your head in his shoulder until gently insistent hands lift your face to his again.

What stops you is a small sound from the child. You might not even have noticed it, coming from behind the metal door, but he's already turning his head to listen. He kisses your forehead before getting up to trigger the controls.

The noises from the hammock sound like sobs. 

"Hey," the man tells him, sitting on the edge of the mattress, leaning in to lay a hand over the little body. "Whatever it is, I'm here." He turns to you. "He cries in his sleep sometimes. Usually I sing to him."

"Then you should." You get up to go sit beside him on the floor and lean your head against his knee. It's the same lullaby you heard that first night on board the Razor Crest. He can barely carry a tune but that's all right, you don't know the melody anyway and you don't understand the words. You stay there for a while even after the child's cries have stopped, as he continues through a half-dozen verses, you resting against him and his hand against your hair.

More of the evening disappears into figuring out his body, into his hands finding confidence in how to touch your skin. 

The last time someone touched you with such reverence, you were probably sixteen years old, trying new things for the first time with a boy you'd grown up with, whose body you'd seen change as you both slipped toward adulthood. He's long gone, that boy, not even buried, just lost in the ash that used to be your home.

Your shirt's off now, too, and he folded it _for_ you, and you can't even explain why that makes you ache inside.

He's tracing your breasts with his fingertips, light against your skin but following every curve. He seems to know, by instinct maybe, to leave your nipples until they're aching for him to touch, and then to follow his fingers with his mouth, with his tongue and then lips and then, so very gently, with his teeth. He's got you panting, your fingers digging hard into his shoulder until you suddenly realize that's the side that was bothering him and you drop your hand. 

He looks up at you, and it takes him a minute to find words. "What's wrong?"

You're slow to make sense, too. "You--you're hurt, I don't want to--" 

He looks down at his own shoulder, the one you were working on together this morning. Then he's pulling you in to him, so very slow again and careful, until you're skin to skin against his body, your breasts pressed up against the muscle of his chest, his head bent down to yours. "Thank you," he says, and it's a whisper against your temple and then just the two of you breathing together for a while, the hum off the ship's engines the only other sound.

You know the shapes of the muscles on his back now. You've run your fingers along the grooves between them. You know now how his skin feels different over scars, and how the burn scar at his neck is different from the knife scar on his side. 

You were surprised to find the small, circular bump of a contraceptive implant on his arm, and at first you looked at him in accusation. From what he’s told you, he shouldn’t have needed it. But he just shrugged. "When I swore the Creed," he said, "I swore I would care for any child I made. I've never been in a place to be able to care for a child." You could feel your eyebrows go up as you nodded toward his bunk, where the tiny being in his care was sleeping. "I'm still not," he said. "It seemed like a good idea, to make sure it couldn't happen." 

He knows the most sensitive spot on your neck by now, and he knows the way you'll move your head if he kisses you there. He knows that if he runs his hands over your belly you'll jump at first, ticklish, but then lean into his touch if he uses a little more pressure. He's figured out what happens if he traces the shell of your ear with his tongue. 

Right now you're kneeling behind him, one hand on his chest, one finger sliding over a stiffened nipple while the other hand traces the hair that trails down his abdomen to the waistband of his trousers. For the first time, you slide your fingertips beneath the fabric. His hand comes up to wrap around your wrist and hold your arm still.

But he doesn't tell you to stop. 

You tuck your chin over his shoulder and ask him if you should.

He doesn't answer. He's sitting up straighter, though, that uncomfortable posture you'd started to hope he'd left behind.

Carefully, you move your hands from his body, and his fingers slide from your wrist as you do. You shift around to face him. 

Slow. You promised him slow. 

Your own body is edging toward impatience. You've been wet for him for hours and, although you're not complaining about any of this so far, there's a sense of _emptiness_ that your body is letting you know, in no uncertain terms, it would like him to fill.

You check in before you move next, get his permission to settle yourself back on his lap, knees to either side of his hips. It lets you press against the length of him through his trousers, and you find you're shivering as the most sensitive part of you connects there.

His voice is a vibration through your own chest as he says, "I can't."

You know you should let go, move back, but your muscles won't listen to your brain until he speaks again, until ingrained reflex takes over when he says the word "Stop." 

He's keeping his hands to himself now, still breathing a little hard but keeping his body constrained. One hand clenches and then slowly opens, coming to rest at his side.

"If we keep going," he says, "I'm going to want you to stay."

Your heart skips for a second, and you're already thinking, _yes._

"I can't let you stay." He's sitting so still. His fingers move again, what seems to be an involuntary tic. It's his right hand, the one that would reach for the blaster that's usually at his hip.

"I can't be distracted. If I had to choose between you and the child--"

He doesn't finish. You don't need him to. You reach over, slowly, slowly, and take his right hand. Slowly, you help him open those clenched fingers, and you place a kiss on his palm. "No promises," you remind him. And then, because there's nothing else you can say: "I'm leaving at Pavotha."

It's still so curious, getting to see his face. How sometimes his expressions are open and sometimes they're unreadable, like in all those years with the helmet on he's lost the ability to mirror certain feelings. Lost the muscle memory.

Right now, though, there's no mistaking that you're looking at pure gratitude.

"Do you still want to stop?" you ask him, and you're asking a little bit for him, but it's mostly because your body is longing to see the rest of his, to touch him in new places. To settle in against him, take his cock inside you, and move together until the rest of the galaxy disappears.

"No promises?" he says.

And, although your whole body is screaming at you not to say it, you tell him again: "Only that I'm leaving."

If you were planetside, it would be dawn by now. But here in the dimly lit hold, there's only the chrono to tell you it's near morning.

You're not looking at it though.

You're sitting on his lap again, legs around his waist and feet planted against the floor. His hands are on your hips. You showed him how this position works and now he's helping you move, bringing you down against him so his cock is buried deep inside you, holding you so there's pressure against your clit as he presses closer, then lifting your body so the length of him slides against your opening, setting every nerve on fire. You didn't teach him to pause sometimes, keeping your hips in place against him, and lean up to kiss you. He figured that out on his own.

He lasted longer than you might have expected the first time, when you drew his body over you and _slow_ disappeared when he said "Are you sure?" and you said "Yes." And although you guided him in gently, carefully, neither one of you could stop after that. You bit your own lip so hard, trying not to cry out and wake the child, that there was blood on both your faces by the end.

You're going to have to sleep soon, before the child wakes up and the new day starts. But for now you're going to stay like this, your skin slicked with your sweat and his, the taste of him in your mouth, and the sacredness of trust between you.


	7. Last Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honoring trust means keeping your promises.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew. This was a journey for me, as well as for the characters. I hope I did justice to their story.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's been reading along and to those of you who joined along the way. Knowing that people were subscribing--wow, someone else wants to know what happens??--was an incredible inspiration.
> 
> If you enjoyed the story, I would love it if you'd let me know. Comments and kudos are life!

When the chrono alarm wakes you, you’re sticky with sweat. Your lips are chapped and your eyes feel stuck shut. The side of your face is pressed against his chest and you’ve got one leg thrown across his thigh, while he’s been holding you close even in sleep. 

But now he’s sliding out from under your weight, tucking the blanket back around you, and going to turn off the blaring noise. 

When you crack your eyes open again, he’s pulled on a pair of trousers and there’s a little green child standing next to your head, peering at you curiously. 

“Hey,” the man says, crouching down to talk to him. “Let’s let her sleep. Can you stay out of trouble while I take a shower?” Those big ears perk up as he speaks. “You know the rules.”

You’re not quite ready to lift your head, but you manage to form some words. “What are the rules?”

“Don’t set the ship on fire,” he says. “Leave the hyperdrive running. Don’t disengage the life support.”

“Has he done that?”

“I turned it back on.”

“I guess I’m glad you laid some rules down.” You feel around for the bundled clothes that form your makeshift pillow. The child wanders away and starts poking at cupboard latches, as if trying to see which ones will open. “He doesn’t understand the rules, does he?”

“No.” He leans down to pick up the pile of neatly folded clothes beside the bedroll, along with the few last pieces that hadn’t gotten folded at all. “Why don’t you go climb into the bunk and get some more sleep?”

You groan into the carrysack. “I’m a mess.”

“You can clean up later. Go sleep.”

You discover quickly that it hurts to move. That vague ache in your back from yesterday has worsened, and your neck is so stiff you can’t turn your head all the way to the left. You end up wrapping the blanket around yourself so you can shuffle over to his sleeping quarters. He stops you on the way to kiss you again, and you can’t help the yelp that comes out of your mouth when, hands on the back of your head, he tips your face up toward him. “Sorry,” you say. “I’m still paying for startling you.”

A moment later he’s picked you up, deposited you carefully on the mattress in his bunk, and is bringing you a cup of that tinny-tasting water. “You should drink.”

The water feels good going down. Your body recognizes how much it needs it. Then you crawl the rest of the way into his bed. The mattress is thin and the blankets are rough, but it’s better than the floor. There’s a faint scent of the stuff he was using to polish the armor. Just two days ago, you were asking if he slept in it. 

He rests one warm hand on your ankle, shaking it gently until you acknowledge him showing you how to operate the door. And then you’re dead to the world again. 

When you emerge a few hours later, the blanket wrapped around you like a robe, he’s at the table, the child on his lap and several pieces of armor spread out in front of them. You sit for a bit at the edge of the mattress, trying to find the energy to stand. 

He’s getting up from his chair. “We’ll go upstairs,” he says, heading for the ladder, and for the first time you’re grateful for his modesty. You’d both been to the ‘fresher in the middle of the night, and you hadn’t thought much of it at all. But right now, you’re not really up for an audience. “There should be water left in the tank, if you want a real shower,” he adds, one foot already on the first rung. “Controls on the left. It’s separate from the galley, so don’t worry if you use it up.”

There’s no such thing as a long shower on a small ship. At least, not a ship like this one. You’ve heard that the big military ships have purifiers, recycling everything back into drinkable water. Supposedly that’s something wealthy people have on board their cruisers, too, but you’ve never seen it. People with that kind of money don’t need to hire people like you. 

Still, even the five minutes you get before the water runs out feels like heaven. Your hair feels properly clean for the first time in ages. The place between your legs is tender, fragile skin rubbed raw in spots, and the warm water is soothing. Even your neck and back feel better.

By the time you’ve gotten dressed, fixed yourself a cup of caff, and downed half a protein bar, you’re feeling almost ready to face a new day. 

He’s flipping through maps on the vidscreen while the child sits in the jumpseat, poking at a board full of switches and buttons that look just like the ones on the Razor Crest’s control panels.

“He knows they’re not real. He’ll humor me for a while, until he gets bored and goes for the real ones.”

You lean over his shoulder. “Is that Pavotha?”

“Yes. We need to decide if we’re landing at the main shipyard, or the second city.”

“The second city’s a little seedier. More underworld. Better for me,” you admit.

He switches back and forth between the maps, studying the layout of the streets. “All right,” he says. “Probably better for me, too. Did you eat?”

You show him the half-finished protein bar in your hand. 

“Good.” He swivels the chair around so he can see your face. “I need to talk to you. Come downstairs?”

It’s the first time you’ve seen the child manage the ladder on his own. You’re already down on the durasteel deck, expecting the man to be right behind you with the child in one arm. But instead, he’s waiting up top while the child scoots along one rung, wraps tiny arms around a side support, and slides his way down to the next rung. The little face is determined as he climbs carefully down, until he gets to the last step. At which point he launches himself to the floor with a happy squeal. 

The man slides down the ladder after him, feet hitting the deck with a thump.

“You don’t worry about him falling, do you?”

“I worry about him all the time.” The child toddles over to where your bedroll is now folded up against the wall, tugs at the blanket resting on top, and promptly pulls it onto his head. He peeks back out from under it, ears flattened by the cloth, which he’s now wearing like a hood. “But how else is he going to learn?”

“If we have to talk,” you say, “can I make another cup of caff first?”

Your mug is sitting on the table beside the beskar backplate. He’s got the chest piece in his hands and the helmet sitting by one elbow. He’s examining the breastplate’s circuitry, holding it up to a bright light affixed to the helmet’s side.

How is he awake enough to be focusing on such precise work? His eyes look tired, but his movements are the same as ever, compact and economical. 

“This isn’t talking,” you say, after several minutes of silence.

“Beskar will stand up to almost anything,” he says, turning the breastplate to examine it from another angle. “When I took the child from the Imperials, we had twenty or thirty bounty hunters trying to stop us. Without this, I would be dead. The Imperials would be experimenting on him.”

He sets down the piece in his hands and picks up the backplate. “I have to keep finding work, so we can keep moving. This stopped an MK-modified rifle bolt.”

Once, you would have been horrified at the idea that making a living meant getting shot at. “It’s good armor.”

“It is.”

You sip at your caff, the bitterness of it filling your mouth, giving you something to focus on instead of worrying about whatever he’s going to say. “Are you telling me this for a reason?”

“Thank you,” he says. “For last night.”

And now you can’t help smiling at how serious he is. “That's not the sort of thing you need to say thank you for.”

He doesn’t smile back. He looks down at his body, covered only in soft cotton and poly weave. "I said I would protect the child. I said I would find his people. I don't know how to do that, like this.” 

He lays his hands out on the table, bare hands that a knife or a blaster burn would easily render useless. “I don't know how to be,” he says, “if I'm not Mandalorian."

You brush your fingertips across his knuckles, across the bruises fading now from blue to yellow. "You did say, there are different ways to be Mandalorian."

He picks up the backplate again, picks up the bright-tipped tool that was laying beside it, and tinkers for a while with the circuits. 

You sip at your caff. 

He finishes running the polishing rag across the armor plate’s surface, sets them both aside. "There is only one Way that I know."

You already promised you were leaving. You have no intention of breaking your word. It still feels like something is slipping away from you. But you are not the only one in this picture. “Do you want that?” 

“I need it,” he says.

“Then,” you say, “what do I do to help you make that happen?”

You understand him well enough, now, to expect that he’ll tell you what he’s thinking. He might just need some time to assemble the words. 

He sets to work on a vambrace, testing the seating of each of the tiny missiles arrayed above the wrist. 

While he continues, you ask to borrow the datapad he and the child were looking at yesterday. That way you can be nearby, but you won’t be tempted to interrupt. You can leave him room for whatever he needs to think through. 

Before long, there are little claws scratching at your leg, and you’ve lifted the child onto your knee. You find a file with pictures of animals from across the galaxy, all arranged by the sounds of their names. A bantha, a bergruutfa, a blistmok, a blurrg. The child knows how to press the button that advances the pictures. He looks up at you now and then, and you discover that if you name the animal you’ll be rewarded with a happy chirp as he moves on to the next one. 

The man’s voice, quiet but clear, brings you back to the conversation. “Your people. If you made a mistake, would they have taken you back?”

You can see where he’s going with this, but you’re not sure it holds. “What kind of mistake?”

“You said they were peaceful. If they knew you fought for a living?”

“It doesn’t matter,” you say. 

“Why not?”

“There’s no one left to disapprove.” 

He looks down at the vambrace, at the intricate mechanism at the wrist, at the tiny explosives made to kill multiple men at one time. “Is that the only reason to believe in something?” 

Is it? You’ve been angry and sad for such a long time now. You move through the world the way you do _because_ there’s no one left to care. Your life, even the way you met this man, is deals and trades that hinge on violence. 

And yet, here you are, still looking for kindness. Still trying to give it.

The child is tapping at your arm. The datapad shows a bulbous creature with rows of sharp teeth. “That’s a cannock,” you tell him. He pushes the control button. Next up is a tall, four-legged animal with a long, curved jaw. “That’s a cherfer. Don’t make him mad, you’d be just about a mouthful for him.” The child gives a little _humph_ as if to say, _that’s enough, you don’t need to editorialize,_ and switches the image again. 

The man is watching you from across the table. You haven’t answered him yet. “Most of your Creed, it’s about the tribe, isn’t it? How you are with other Mandalorians.” You’re thinking about the words as you speak them. “Loyalty to your clan. Helping each other. What if you were the only one left?”

“I suppose,” he says slowly, “I’d have to rebuild.”

“All by yourself?”

He sets the vambrace down and holds out his arms, palms up, bare of gloves and armor. “I wouldn’t do a very good job, would I?”

He would, though. You’re sure he would. “I think you'd care, and that's what matters."

“Do you think your people would forgive you?”

“I think,” you say, “you need to forgive yourself.”

Sleeping late makes the day slip away that much faster. The maintenance on the armor done, the three of you gather around the table again for a mid-day meal. The gleaming beskar plates have been carefully put away, for now, wrapped in soft fabric and tucked in a cupboard beside the armory. 

The lack of sleep is finally starting to show in his movements. He’s slow to get up when the meal is done and actually yawns before reminding the child that it’s naptime. You offer to take care of cleaning cups and ration trays, and when you finish you find him leaning against the wall by the bunk, watching the child sleep.

You’re halfway across the narrow floor, meaning to slip your arms around his waist, when you remember and stop a meter or so away. “Maybe you should have a nap too.”

“Maybe I should,” he says, turning to sink down at the edge of the thin mattress. When he looks back at you, it’s still that full movement of head and upper body, as if he’s looking through a visor. “Will you join me?”

Your own face must show confusion, or maybe it’s that your eyes go to the little hammock, to the child curled up there.

“Just to sleep,” he says.

“You don’t think he’ll be upset?” 

“I think he’ll feel safer. I think he likes knowing we’re friends.”

It’s dark in the small space, with just enough room for the two of you to curl up together. He nudges you over onto your side, one arm cushioning your head and the other wrapped around you. 

You’re pretty sure he’s already asleep, when he speaks softly against your hair. “You helped me take the armor off,” he says. “Will you help me put it back on?”

You can think of several things you’d rather do instead, none of which are appropriate with a child sleeping in this same room. You find his hand, trace the shape of his wrist, work your hand up under the edge of his sleeve and listen to his breathing change as you run your fingers over his skin. “Of course I will.”

The ship’s chrono tells you there are about eight hours left before planetfall. You’ve had a much less eventful game of tag today, you’ve each fit in a quick workout, he’s checked the hyperdrive controls to make sure the ship’s still on course. The child's long since been tucked in for the night. 

You’re dressed in fresh clothes again, hair crackling with static from the sonic shower, and you’re thinking about what you said to him that first night. About celebrating after a fight well won, celebrating being alive. 

Only this time the sweat you just washed away was not from battle, but from the past few hours of slow, careful time.

Your brain’s replaying pictures that echo on your skin. His face as he leans down to kiss you. The weight of his body on yours. His hands in your hair.

At one point you let him walk you up against that wall by the galley and hold you there, pinning your body in place while he pushed into you, head bent down and face buried against your neck. When he finally let you go, his eyes were wet and his lips tasted of salt.

You’ve managed not to say the thing your heart keeps wanting. You’re leaving this ship in the morning. You won’t be looking back. The words _I love you_ aren’t going to help anyone here, in any way, at all. 

You still haven’t asked for his name. 

He’s sitting on a crate in the hold, now, dressed in the flightsuit that underlies the armor. The pieces of his armor are laid out, neatly, on the surfaces of crates nearby.

Start with the boots, he said, and so you do. You wrap one hand around the back of his right calf and slide your palm slowly down the curve of muscle to his ankle where, beneath the cloth, skin lies thinner over fragile-feeling bone. When you go to settle his foot into the right boot, he sits there and lets you control the movement, knee and ankle loose in your hands. You do the same on the left side, then sink back on your heels to look at the metal clasps that hold the boots on. 

“Like this?”

He tilts his head down to watch as you click them into place, one by one. “Yes.”

It’s a clever mechanism. You’ve had shoelaces come untied in a fight, and it’s not pretty when that happens. 

The greave that holds spare rifle shells clicks into place over the right boot, and then the next piece is the metal guard that sits over his left knee. He shows you how it should fit, how it fastens. You push his hands away, gently, and lift the piece aside to plant a kiss over his kneecap before you settle it back again and click the fastener closed. 

You can hear him take a slow, deep breath. 

Fitting the thigh guards requires him to stand. You’re still on your knees, and now, before you set this next barrier between your body and his, you circle palms and fingers around his right thigh. The shapes of him are an anatomy lesson, defined hamstrings tapering to the hollow at the back of his knee. Your fingertips press along the muscles at each side of his thigh, thumbs sliding over the wiring embedded in the flightsuit.

His hand settles against the side of your head. 

You pick up one of the thigh guards and hold it in your hand, admiring the balance of it, how perfectly the surface shines. You curve your other hand over the place on his leg where that armor plate will sit, feeling the cloth warm from the heat between your palm and his skin. 

His fingers tighten in your hair. 

When you go to set the thigh guard in place, you can’t recall exactly how the catches work. “You’re going to have to help me.”

He’s slow to move, lifting his hand from your head as though it’s gone heavy.

“Like this,” he says, fingers guiding yours.

It’s beginning to feel like a ritual. You repeat your process on the other leg, pressing your touch into his skin before setting the beskar against his thigh. This time you’re able to fasten the plate yourself. When you look up you see his hands are at his sides now, fingers curled into loose fists. His eyes are closed. He’s breathing slow and measured, like he’s needing to think about it. 

You get to your feet, standing close, and place a palm flat against his chest, like you did when all this began. His heart is pounding. 

_Last chance._ You step closer, lining your body against his, ready to move away if this isn't what he wants. As his arms come up to wrap around you, you slip your palm over his ribs and around to the middle of his back. Your other hand goes to the base of his spine. The curves of the armor plates press hard against your own thighs. His hips hit just above yours. You can feel his body responding to the closeness, but you will your own hips to stay still, don't push in against him. If he changes his mind, if he wants you to recognize his arousal, he knows he can lead you there.

The side of your face is pressed into the space where his neck and collarbone meet. You find yourself matching your breathing to his. 

Measured, focused, slow.

Five breaths, ten, a dozen, until you're able to get your mouth to form the words against his skin. "What's next?"

Five breaths more until his arms around you loosen. 

The next piece is a quilted gambeson, like a short jacket. Foundations for the pauldrons are embedded at the shoulders. There is a flexible plate in front that will protect him from chest to pelvis, below where the beskar chestplate ends. You examine how the plate is integrated with the fabric, a series of soft, flat buckles holding it in place. 

“This isn’t beskar.”

“It’s a synthetic,” he says, his voice shaky on the first syllables but smoothing out as he settles into familiar territory. “It has to be able to bend, so I can move. It can take a couple of blaster bolts, as long as it’s not close range.”

You take his hand and fold his fingers around one edge of the quilted fabric. “Hold this for me?” 

You shape your hands around his ribs, then, sliding over fabric that hides his skin beneath, then flatten your fingers across abdominal muscles, feeling the shapes and ridges there, taking time for this vulnerable place where there’s no bone to stop a knife. Those muscles move as he breathes, still deep and steady and slow. 

You help him slip his arms through the sleeves. The gambeson fastens down one side with hook-and-loop tape, reinforced with a half dozen hook-and-eye closures that hide beneath the seam. 

You slide one finger down that seam, closed now and holding the garment snug to his body, and feel him shiver.

The cuirass, front and back plates, is next. It’s attached to its own tightly woven vest, and like the thigh guards, it’s lighter than it looks. You’re able to hold it in one hand while you trace the outline of the breastplate on his chest. The layers of cloth make it harder to feel the shapes of him, but you find the hollow below his collarbone and then the ridge of each rib, continuing down the sides of his chest to the last curve of bone. 

You place another kiss, this one against the cloth at the top of his sternum, and his breath catches but he doesn’t move, just lets you continue to touch him before the beskar hides his body away again. 

He guides your hands to fit the vest in place and fasten it, so that you’re working together to get the pieces set.

“I’m sorry it’s not different,” you find yourself saying, fingers still touching his. Sorry isn’t really the right word but you don’t have a better one. 

“I wish it were,” he says.

He hands you the right pauldon first. You want to press a bite into his shoulder beneath where it will sit, where the top of the muscle connects to bone, but there’s already metal over that spot for the pauldron to attach. Instead, you go up on tiptoe and run your teeth along the bare skin on the left side of his neck, then trace the same line with your tongue, and finally smooth the spot with your fingers as you click the pauldron into place on the opposite side. The sound he makes as you do--somewhere between a gasp and a groan--makes you want to rip the armor back off his body.

You trace one finger over the mudhorn signet. “It’s good that he has you. You’re right to put him first.”

Once the left pauldron is also in place, he reaches silently to the remaining items laid out on the crate beside him. He lifts the thick leather belt that’s studded with sections of metal, with more plates of that synthetic material bolted on and a flat piece of beskar between them. It’s heavy, needing both your hands and most of your attention to lift it into place.

There’s the strap like a bandolier that goes over his left shoulder, then the belt with its sturdy metal buckle. The beskar plate rests at his lower back, and at each side is protection for his hips. You have to think how to build in softness here, to make his body remember kindness with this piece, too. You slip a hand beneath one of the plates, resting light over his hip bone, and feel his weight shift just the slightest bit toward your palm. 

The last pieces are vambraces, handplates, gloves. You start with the left side and weave your fingers between his, feeling the strength in his hand as it curls around yours. You’re not sure if the pulse you feel at the base of your fingers is his or your own. 

But then, you need both your hands to slide on the leather glove, follow his instructions to fit the vambrace, and clip the flat piece of metal that guards the back of his hand into place. 

Once more on the other side, skin to skin, then leather glove, then beskar. 

You lower his hand back down to his side and force yourself to let go. 

Step back.

“How does it feel?”

He breathes, breastplate rising and falling. “It feels more like me.”

Again, your body echoes his. Deep, slow breaths, and it helps you stay centered, helps your hands stay steady, helps you stay that half-meter away. 

“I’ll go upstairs so you can sleep,” you say. “I can bunk down up there. Let you get comfortable again.”

“Thank you,” he says. And then, one hand half-lifted toward you, “Can I still--”

“Of course you can.”

The beskar feels cool through your thin shirt, but his mouth is warm, and his hand at the back of your neck is gentle. You sink your fingers into his hair, hands fisting in those soft curls, letting the sounds he makes vibrate against your skin.

Dawn on Pavotha is muddy-looking, the sky a dull brownish-grey. You’re standing with him in the ship’s entryway, your pack sitting at your feet. Your rifle's in its sling beside it, ready to be clipped on. It's a good system, the result of months of trial and error. You're not as quick as he is with his blaster, but that rifle draws smooth and fast. 

He's suited up. The armor plates are secured, electrical connections clicked in and catches locked, rifle across his back and blaster at his right hip. He’s got the helmet in one hand.

The child is tucked into the carry-bag on his other side, contentedly gnawing at a piece of flatbread.

You crouch down to the child's level and rest your weight on one knee, careful of the healing bruise there, so you're face to face to say goodbye.

"It was nice getting to know you, kid." Big eyes look at you over the flatbread. "Take care of your dad, yeah?" The child looks up at the man, gives a cheerful chirp, and turns his attention back to eating. You run a finger along one of the wrinkles in his forehead, feeling the soft fuzz there. 

The little head tilts, and then he's offering the bread to you. 

"That's ok kiddo. You keep that."

Back on your feet, and now you’re meeting the man’s gaze again.

"You'll be alright out there?" he says.

"Will you?"

He laughs, and you're glad because it _was_ a joke, a strange kind of joke when there's a perfectly fine chance that one or both of you will be patching up wounds by nightfall. 

He's still smiling as he reaches out, pausing with his hand a few centimeters from your face to ask, "May I?" 

"I told you you could."

His palm rests against your cheek, fingertips at your temple. You're up on tiptoe to meet him as he leans in to kiss you. He tastes like the caff you both had with breakfast. 

This is making it hard to leave.

The kiss finally slows, then stops, because you both know you need to be out there in this morning, when the city comes alive. He rests his forehead against yours for what feels like minutes, and it feels like pulling apart magnets when he finally steps back. 

He goes to put the helmet on. 

"Wait," you say. "Before you do that."

He looks at you, head tilted, curious, and it takes you back to that night on Tatooine. "This," you say, with a gesture back into the ship, back to the past few days and so much in them. "This never happened."

He leans in to kiss you one more time. 

"It did."

He straightens up. Settles the helmet in place and he’s a Mandalorian again, anonymous in the armor. He hits the control to lower the ramp. 

"Good luck," you tell him, as you step off onto the scuffed duracrete of Pavotha's spaceport.

"Until our paths cross," he says.

"Until our paths cross."


End file.
